two people
sit across from each other
they act like they're in love
but they are not in love
two children
who try to be adults
attempt to listen
but they're not listening
two lovers
struggling to live
take it one day at a time
one son
one mother
try to understand
but ignorance is not given
to those who won't understand
one dreamer
young and naïve
she's gonna change the world  
she just doesn't know it yet
    the man in the corner
    is sipping his coffee
    but he doesn't like it
    he prefers tea
        the woman over there
        is writing a novel
        she's been writing
        for three weeks
            the elderly woman
            is always alone
            almost as though
            she's waiting for another
               and the waitress
               is just trying pay
               the bills that are due
               the next day

every life is a movie
and everyone's got their struggles

but it's just another day
at the Blueside Society Cafe

There might have been a time
When I wasn’t full of fear so topped off
Like a gassy sombrero
like a burrito left in the
Sun to bake and there might have
Been a
Time
When I hadn’t yet eaten a burrito
landlocked
In New England, locked in a small state of
Fear and knowing that knowing
just isn’t
Enough.
There might have
Been
A time when luxury was a nickel
apiece paperback
Book at the Unitarian Church fall sale
to raise funds for
Their roof.
To raise their
Roof.
And there
Might
Have been a joy in my spark
Plugs,
A joy
In my canter
A Joy in
My legs that preceded my
Fears.
There might
Have
Been a time:
When I would pick one of the seven records we owned
And delicately put it on the turntable, thinking I will
Have my own money and
buy my own music.
When I idly lift the leaded paint
from the 200 year old wood
And scratch it to smell its sweet aroma.
And put my hand on the glass pane
Think hard enough and open your eyes and it will be
1838 again.
Oh where are the people?
Oh where
when there might have been a time
Did I not see who they are?
Or they did not register.
I must have watched them everyday
Observant
so keen to be seen
Is it possible to feel so much
for feeling so little?
Or did I feel gulfs of embrace
that were not there?
I wanted and I desired and I dug.
I craved and thought and speculated
and clung.
And there might have
Been
A time when I roared on my Schwinn down the long empty
Roads of my town.
Invoking our gods.
Invoking my claims.
There was a time when I stuttered with
Compassion and could
feel a touch observed
There was a time:
Across the street in a
lit house at dusk.
Their curtains are open, their lights are on.
Oh, the sun has settled down
There is that time, golden, when I
Look into your kitchen, and the wallpaper is
Blue and harvest gold with small pictures of oil lamps on
Them and your walls are mustard gold.
Your plates are unbreakable
I see them lustre in the
Overhead light, fashioned like a wagon wheel.
Guns ablazin’.
Trails awash.
There might be a time when I can slip back
Into your kitchen
lick the plates and then
Run my fingers over
the wall paper.
Tracing the outline of the oil
lamps imprinted.

Nina Simone, occupying ears singing about bed and dressers.
Sparsely populated
young couple
Interrupted by saying amusements.
Only two stops
I know where to get off

I knew to mind the gap
I'm a responsible citizen
Voter with a valid railcard
Only two stops
Purchased a ticket
Only two stops
I can not throw up in that time

I can not clear my system of over-priced beer
A niche in the market
Exploited in the name of money Making let's just raise them
let's charge extortionate rates for an autoimmune disease

Paying to support a normal drinking culture embedded into the narrative
Growing by in the western world Listening to Nina Simone
Only one stop now you'd never know what life would be like

Without loud pop charts entertaining a few leaving the others yearning the return of ABBA when times were simpler and people cared about Eurovision and illegal music was your own

“Tickets please”
He seems awfully jolly for a late night ****-shift on Arriva Trains Wales
Who's making him work and why's he So ******* happy about it
Real extra effort! Soul sapping in my opinion
Last stop gotta get off.

a white coat of frost
covered the spindly grass
near our town's river

out toward the east
a heavily laden cloud brow
poured down its rain

(verb) Observe.

1. Notice or perceive (something) and register it as being significant.
1.1. Watch (someone or something) carefully and attentively.

Observe all. See all as significant.
Especially that which seems strikingly not so.
Watch it carefully, attentively, examine the subject, the object, the Thought. Stop and take your thoughts in, then;

Sit and let the words out;
Sit and be quick, for observations are constant;
Sit and you may forget them all, so
Sit, and write.

Observe beauty—or ugliness—in the mundane
And the daily.
The prettiness of flowers is well documented
As is personal love.

Observe feeling without vague subjectiveness
Or dreamt-up narrative.
Observe your surroundings and take in that moment
Five minutes to write it down
(Or ten, if you're lucky).

Cast away your barriers.
Meter and rhyme,
Lines ending with full sto—
—Vocabulary narcissism.

Let everyone understand your words, for
Poetry is not for the well-educated
Or the creative
Or the recluse,

Poetry is for all that observe
And register their sights and sounds significant.
The poet merely watches carefully and attentively
Then marks it down

(noun) Poetry

1. Observation

They’re just walking by
Idle sticks and logs and twigs
Wayward trees passing to and fro
In their forests of isolation
The birds don’t sing there
If they do
Then each tree hears its own tune
My tree is cut
Just a stump
Just my luck
I have no birds to sing anyway
Accept for this one wayward jay
It’s less of a song
More of an ironic cackle
Laughing at my stump
Chained to this rusted shackle
There used to be a song
Sweet like sugar
Bitter like sole cinnamon
But harmonious
Lovely
Divine
Mine
Now I’m just walking by
An idle stick
A log
A twig
A wayward tree stump
Just my lonely luck

it doesn't get better

Nothing satiates a haze,
however a *****'s breath
and sorrow makes it wallow.

A cylindrical prison
pounding ideas forevermore
into your scalped recompense.

Take away these porcelain
walls or rip down the violet
curtains smothering it all.